


After the Balcony

by Gwynne



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-21
Updated: 2010-11-21
Packaged: 2017-10-13 07:40:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/134739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gwynne/pseuds/Gwynne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happened after Gregor hit the ground.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After the Balcony

After the jumping and falling and spinning and clutching there comes the final crash. And then there’s one moment of perfect, total, still silence. No movement, no breath. No more gravity left.

Stillness. Point of equilibrium.

And then the world comes back.

Take a breath. Take a roll call. Arms. Legs. Head. Body. Focus on each in turn, waiting for pain.

No pain. Nothing serious. No apparent damage.

Move. Brain, send the message. Make the bits move. See if they can.

Twitches, wriggles. They move.

Now, to stand up.

Complicated process. Easier to just lie here. Someone will come.

Nobody comes.

Nobody heard. All that noise and nobody heard?

It wasn’t that much noise. Just a lifetime wrapped up in a second or two.

Nobody is coming to help. Have to get up. Lying here like a dying beetle. Need to roll over. Arms, push.

Flip achieved. Face in the dirt. Not an improvement.

Knees. Knees needed. Need knees.

Stupid knees. Scratched.

It takes a while to achieve verticality. Gravity is fighting back.

I can beat gravity.

I am up. On two feet. That means I have to go…somewhere.

Back up to the apartment? Could always try again. Maybe I need to push out more this time. That was the problem, I was too close to the wall and the vines slowed my fall, right up to the time I landed in the bushes and bounced out.

Darn balcony is too low for a decent suicide dive. How dare they give their emperor a defective balcony. Typical damn Komarrans. If this was Barrayar I’d be a bloody smear on the ground by now. Barrayar knows how to build for death. We’ve had plenty of practice.

Have to get back to the apartment. Do it right this time. Door. Through the door.

But there’s armsmen there.

My armsmen. And Impsec. My Impsec too. I’m the Imp in Impsec. They’re the secs.

I’m sure not the damn secs. Never get any sex at all. Too many damn Impsecs around.

So I just go through the door and…

… and they look at me. And ask questions. And call medics. And more Impsec, because one squad is never enough. And the armsmen will all fuss. No more balconies tonight. Won’t even get a bath in private, they’ll want to check me and medicate me and sober me up.

Sober is over-rated. If I was sober I wouldn’t have bounced out of that bush.

Drunk is better for bouncing. But they’ll fuss and flutter and sober me up.

I don’t want fuss.

Quiet. I want quiet. I want ….

I want not to be me. Tried it from the balcony, but I bounced. Must be another way.

Another way. Another me.

Nobody knows I’m here. For the first time in my life nobody knows where I am. For the first time in my life I’m truly alone.

I can walk along a street….alone.

A street… to where?

Anywhere. Alone. Truly alone.

I’m truly me.

Who am I?

For the first time in my life I can find out.


End file.
